Michael Long column: Robinson's life beyond sports

FILE ? 9 April 2013: The movie, '42' released on April 12, 2013 tells the story of Jackie Robinson, the first African American to play in Americas Major League Baseball (MLB) in the modern era for the Brooklyn Dodgers, making his first appearance on April 15, 1947. Robinson died in 1972, aged 53. American professional baseball player Jackie Robinson (1919 - 1972) of the Brooklyn Dodgers, dressed in a road uniform, crouches by the base and prepares to catch a ball, 1951. Throughout the course of his baseball career Robinson played several positions on the infield as well as serving as outfielder. (Photo by Keystone/Getty Images)

In the discussion of "42" - the new movie about Jackie Robinson's role in shattering racial barriers in Major League Baseball - let's keep in mind that this courageous Hall of Famer also devoted his post-baseball life to securing first-class citizenship for all Americans.

After integrating baseball, Robinson became a full-fledged leader in the civil rights movement. As a board member of the NAACP, he traveled across the country in an effort to build morale among African Americans fighting for racial justice in their local communities. And as a friend of Martin Luther King Jr., Robinson helped to lead civil rights campaigns in Albany (Ga.) and Birmingham. While in Albany, he was so moved by the efforts of black parishioners to register African-American voters - despite the fact that their church had been burned to the ground -that he offered to raise enough money to rebuild several torched churches.

In 1964, Robinson then founded Freedom National Bank in Harlem as a protest against white financial institutions that discriminated against African Americans by denying them loans or setting interest rates artificially high. And while he criticized Harlem resident Malcolm X for advocating racial separatism and the use of "any means necessary," Robinson saved his harshest public criticism for white politicians, including Presidents Dwight Eisenhower, John Kennedy and Richard Nixon, when they hesitated, as they often did, to advance civil rights legislation.

Robinson had a close partner in these efforts - his loving wife Rachel. Together, Jackie and Rachel soothed tensions among civil rights leaders and raised countless dollars for the movement by hosting jazz picnics at their home in Stamford, Conn. The picnics offered a respite, if only for several hours, from the demands and dangers of civil rights activism.

These few examples of Robinson's post-baseball life can help us begin to understand a claim he made in 1968: "I think I've become much more aggressive since I left baseball." Coming from a man who stole home plate in the 1955 World Series, this claim gives us some indication of the importance he attributed to his baseball life.

What fueled Robinson's aggression after baseball? No doubt, deadly violence against civil rights activists played a role. But if we dig a bit deeper, we can see that he was especially driven by his long-held belief that the people of God have an obligation to "set the captive free." Thanks to religious mentors, especially his mother Mallie, Robinson embraced a social gospel that called for freedom and justice right here and right now.

Just as important as faith was his love for his children - Jackie Jr., Sharon and David - and his hope that their lives would not see the same struggles for racial justice. Here's part of a letter that Robinson wrote Malcolm X in 1963: "America is not perfect by a long shot, but I happen to like it here and will do all I can to make it the kind of place where my children and theirs can live in dignity."

He was not exaggerating. Far beyond home plate, far beyond the World Series, and far beyond the Hall of Fame, Jackie Robinson became a civil rights leader in his own right, increasingly personifying the first-class citizenship he considered the birthright of all Americans, whatever their race.

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Michael Long column: Robinson's life beyond sports

In the discussion of '42' ? the new movie about Jackie Robinson's role in shattering racial barriers in Major League Baseball ? let's keep in mind that this courageous Hall of Famer also devoted his

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